Chapter Thirty-Six

Ambrose blinked and found himself snarling at the bony face of a skeleton. This skeleton was unlike the others; its eyes were like gaping wounds, and dried blood at their corners was like black tears. It wore tattered robes of gray, purple, and white. It floated in the air, holding a staff of twisted, bleached bone with dark purple-red vines that twisted around it like a thorny rope.

The vines around the staff were undulating, pulsing with dark light. The light was a trail in the air that led from Ambrose’s head to the staff. The light was receding as Noelle roared at the skeletal mage. Ambrose glanced around him and found himself in a vast room with a large sarcophagus on a dais in the center. The sarcophagus’s lid was broken, and chunks of it scattered on the floor. The smell of old bone, dust, and dirt floated in the air.

Ambrose used [Insight] on the skeleton.

[Mordred’s Avatar-Lich- Level 98]

“Your mind is delicious, Knight. So much self-loathing within you.”

Ambrose produced his axe from his bag, flooding it with mana after using [Infernal Infusion] and [Infernal Smite]. He flung the axe at the Lich’s face. At the same time, Noelle bounded forward, lightning sheathing her like a cloak; she slashed a paw, and a claw made of baby blue lightning slashed forward while the axe embedded itself into the skeleton. The lightning claw closed around the Lich, exploding with a flash and thunderous boom.

The Lich exploded like a detonating bomb, a shower of splintered, shattered bone rocking outward in deadly shards. Ambrose used [Infernal Aegis], just in time, too, as the shards attempted to skewer him. His shield blocked most of it while a blanket of fear and doubt settled over the room.

Noelle shot to the side, lightning crackling around her feet, increasing her speed at power.

Ambrose narrowed his one eye at the broken remains of the skeleton. It appeared he had won—except he hadn’t gotten a notification. Noelle snarled at the bones as red-purple light coalesced around them, coming forth from them as if they had an inner glow.

They rose into the air on the tide of that same light, snapping together like puzzle pieces. Ambrose didn’t just let it happen. He recalled his axe and threw it again, abyssal flames shining around it as it flew towards the skeleton Lich with deadly speed.

It hit a barrier of purple-red light that flared brightly, repelling the axe. It clattered to the floor, the clangs echoing throughout the room. Ambrose frowned. The Lich reformed, a dry chuckle echoing from stone to stone. It pointed its staff at Noelle and sent a dart of dark light blasting towards her.

Ambrose used [Infernal Recall], willing the axe into the path of the dark bolt, cutting it in half, causing it to miss the tiger. The split dark orbs slammed into the stone walls behind her, cracks splitting down the middle. Noelle rushed forward, lightning racing along her length. She leaped onto the skeleton, but its purple-red light shield shimmered, preventing her flashing and deadly claws from raking it apart.

The light swirled, and Noelle was blasted away, crashing into the wall. Ambrose’s heart skipped a beat, but the arcane white tiger got to her feet, shaking her head and bearing her impressive fangs. Ambrose summoned his axe to his hand in a burst of black-red flame from where it lay on the floor. Light shone from the Lich’s staff and struck outward like a serpent going for prey, latching itself onto Ambrose’s head.

He felt it when the darkness tried to return to his mind. To drown him in an ocean of self-loathing, doubt, and hellish memories where his dead wife scorned him and hated him. Except he wasn’t playing that game any longer. Ambrose put up walls of true memory with mental effort to repel the false. He and Alice playing D&D, he and Alice in bed, her touch on his face, the feeling of her lips.

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He cast it all at the darkness like an attack within itself, and the darkness had no foothold on his mind. That’s the thing about the dark; the light exposes it. Ambrose thought.

The Lich had a mind behind it, Mordred, and the time it took Ambrose to fight off the darkness was all it needed to hit him with a bright green ball of light that coursed through him like lightning, locking up Ambrose’s body; he fell to the ground, twitching, one eye shifting wildly. Noelle bounded forward, dodging the green light as lightning crackled around her like a mini storm.

The arcane white tiger leaped once more, roaring in defiance. Ambrose saw the Lich lift one bony hand, dark energy gathering, and the purple shield shimmering with red light. Ambrose knew what would happen before it did, and he did the only thing he could do at the moment: He unmanifested her. Her leaping form burst into white and black shards of light, flowing towards and around Ambrose into the white and black striped cloak that tightened around him.

Noelle pulsed with disapproval but also understanding.

Ambrose couldn’t move; every time he tried, his muscles spazzed, twitching with pain. The Lich hovered over him, its skull cocked, regarding him with those glowing eyes.

“You didn’t even realize, did you? You dropped your shield to fend off that mental attack. Tsk. I thought better of you, Knight. It was a small mistake, yet it cost you your life. Goodbye, Knight.”

The Lich lifted a hand and gathered death within it.

Ambrose Severen did not give up until the final bell rang. Don’t just lay there and die. Do something, boy! His father’s voice. He dismissed it as he was already working on a solution. Black-red power blazed into the stone around them as Ambrose used [Infernal Infusion] to infuse the surrounding area. Simultaneously, he tapped [Infernal Aegis] and [Infernal Sanctuary]. Chains of ghostly black fire shot up around him, attempting to skewer the Lich. Its shield pulsed, but it succeeded in bringing the Lich to the ground, which Ambrose wanted.

Infernal-aspected mana swam beneath the stone, lighting it in a blaze of abyssal flame, casting horrific, moving shadows on the walls around them. Then Ambrose used [Recall] just as the Lich released its attack.

Gravity vanished from that room of death and terror for a moment. The stone lifted up, shooting towards him in a torrent of stone, burning to ash as it hit his shield. He and the Lich fell into a black void, Noelle flapping around him as she caught air.

Whatever spell the Lich had hit Ambrose with, it could no longer hold him. Ambrose recalled his axe as they fell through the air and brought it down after activating [Infernal Smite] onto the Lich. It tried to hover in the air, but Ambrose kept knocking it down with his axe. [Infernal Aegis] was putting in the work, and his smite was eating away at the undead’s shield.

All the while, they fell into a seemingly endless void, falling stones all around them. Ambrose knew almost instinctively that they were headed towards Avalon’s core, where the tree and Vivienne resided. He slashed again with his axe, the force of his attacks echoing around them in crashing booms.

The Lich tried to blast Ambrose, but he maintained his shield, repelling the attacks. He clenched his jaw, one eye glittering, a flash of worry causing his hands to clench. He was worried about a mental attack from the Lich. Just as that worry manifested within his mind, Ambrose saw the staff the Lich held the light up with that same light, which struck out toward him.

Noelle’s mind flared, wrapping around his thoughts in a comforting barrier of warm companionship that repelled the Lich’s attack without Ambrose having to expend mental energy. It allowed Ambrose to smash through Mordred’s Avatar’s shield. It burst apart in shards of ugly red and purple.

Ambrose flung the axe away and grabbed the Lich in a bear hug as they fell. It struggled against him, but Ambrose held him tight. He activated Avalon’s key and teleported them to just above the lake of lava where they had fought the fire kraken and fell into it with a hissing splash.

Ambrose had a newly upgraded shield skill, and his old one had been enough to stop the lava from turning him to ash. The Lich no longer had such protection, and it hadn’t been expecting them to teleport here. Its bones burned away to nothing in a matter of moments. Ambrose teleported himself out of the lava and on the island’s surface.

He was now surrounded by trees. A notification appeared before him.

[You have defeated [Mordred’s Avatar-Lich- Level 98] and have advanced to level 91. Knight of Avalon has advanced to level 15]

He had done it. Three down. One more to go. Let’s finish this, Mordred.